Pergolesi’s comic intermezzo, La serva padrona, was one of the most popular operas of the eighteenth century. Premiered in Naples in 1733, the work was met with audience acclaim—and tremendous critical controversy—after performances in Paris, Versailles, and Fontainebleau in the early 1750s. The imported Italian style incited a dispute known as the querelle des bouffons (or “war of the comic actors”), pitting partisans of modern, ultramontane comedy against defenders of the traditional and eminently “French” genre of courtly tragedy. This talk offers an introduction to the French opera wars of the 1750s—and Madame de Pompadour’s role within them—exploring both developments in musical aesthetics and the political ramifications of these shifts.